Laptop Advice and Information!!!

[skatepunk834]

Does anybody have experience with Emachines notebooks? I'm new to the notebook field and this is going to be my first one. It is a M2350 with an athlon xp 2800+, 512DDR2700, ATI Mobility RADEON IGP 320M Video, and a 60 gig hd on it with Windows Home SP2. It also has the dvd/cdrw combo drive. Basically what I'm using it for is everyday wireless web surfing. I am going to be bringing it to school every day too. I plan on keeping mp3's, documents, etc on it. I want to be able to play games on it too (such as counter strike, redalert2, the sims, rct3, etc. but nothing too demanding like doom3 or half life2) I want to keep it powered on alot while I'm away because I want to run an ftp server and keep my screen name on all the time. I really want it to be sort of smooth and not too laggy or slow, but I have an under $850 budget right now. I have a buddy who has an emachines, and he loves it. Will this meet my needs and stuff or should I just say forget it? I thought it to be a really good value and pretty fast.

 

[diabloII]

the onboard graphics looks a little weak to me to support any gaming

it would work, but will probably be laggy as hell

 

[skatepunk834]

or if anybody knows a good website to buy cheap, refurbished laptops at a great price under $900 we'll say. i just checked out tigerdirect.com on their refurbs, stuff seemed pretty decent considering its my first notebook and i don't need exceptional power

 

[ProdigyMytch]

www.pricewatch.com is a site that my dad uses. I've never used it though.

 

[mckc86]

gateway's notebooks can have a 10hr life per charge
some models even have Nvidia 6600 to support games(slow for deamanding games though)

 

[Trotter]

Here are three sites you can check out.

http://onthegopc.com/ - Highly recommended.

http://www.techforless.com/cgi-bin/tech4less/sqlresults?id=Ru7m8xYb&mv_pc=139 - Refurbished and repackaged laptops.

http://refurbdepot.com/category.cfm?PageID=205 - Refurb Depot laptop page.